


Bruises

by beelivia



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Angst, Blood, Bruises, Death, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, Major character death - Freeform, Trauma, repeat attacks, semi-graphic sexual assault, was supposed to be a drabble but look what happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 16:18:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15688992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beelivia/pseuds/beelivia
Summary: Sonny's always bruised easily.





	Bruises

**Author's Note:**

> This was betad by the awesome @rafaelscarisi on tumblr! They're super great and also a hella talented writer, so def check them out <3

Sonny has always bruised easily. All it takes is bumping into the desk on the way by or shoulder-checking someone on the street by accident, and a purple mark blooms from the point of contact. It’s somewhat of a joke in the squad, especially after he got a black eye from walking into the break room door frame. He laughs along. Even when Amanda whistles because there are faint pink marks from kissing on his neck the day after a date.

Right now, he knows he’s going to have bruises.

He can’t see the man’s face because of the way he’s pressed face down on the floor of a public restroom, but he can feel the tight grip on his wrists holding his arms down and the angry pressure of knees holding his legs open. Despite knowing exactly what to do in a situation like this, he can’t do anything  except freeze and watch the slanted reflections of fluorescent lights on the grubby ceramic tile. He can feel a vague pain in the back of his mind, but mostly he’s numb; it’s easier to block out the feel of the cold tile against his bare stomach where his henley has been shoved up, or the pain of the awkward position he has been forced into, or the other things he can’t bring himself to think about.

And after it’s over, a hand tangles in his hair and yanks his head up.

“I’ll be back.”

Then he’s alone, and he doesn’t know when he started crying but now he can’t stop, and there’s a faint ache in his whole body and the ghost of nausea in his stomach. Sonny struggles to his feet, fixing his clothes and stumbling out of the bathroom. He needs to go home. No one notices him stumbling out of the restroom of Forlini’s, a place that’s supposed to be more classy. It’s a gathering spot for the squad at the end of a rough shift or the conclusion of a grueling trial. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, looks down, and walks outside so he can hail a cab home.

As soon as he walks in his front door, he goes straight to the bathroom to scrub away the grime. When he sees his reflection, he can see the beginnings of a bruise on his cheek from where it  hit against the tiles when he was forced down. Bile rising in the back of his throat, he turns away from the mirror and steps into the warm shower like it’ll wash everything away. He tries not to look at the marks he knows are all over him because it’ll hurt. Once he’s clean, he dries off, throws on a hoodie and sweatpants, and passes out on his bedroom floor with his arms wrapped around himself.

The next morning, when Sonny gets up and gets dressed for work, he realizes how awful he looks. His skin is pale and clammy,  with circles under his eyes and bruises on his wrists, legs, face, and the curves of his hip bones where they were slammed against the floor as well. Dark purples blossoming in violets and irritated reds make him wince before he pulls on his clothes to cover them  up. Buttoned vest, rolled down sleeves, clean coat. The only thing visible is his face, and once he drinks some water and fixes his hair, he promises himself it isn’t that noticeable. He’ll be fine to go to work and no one has to know how he froze. 

He tells victims every day it’s not their fault if they’re assaulted. It’s not their fault if they freeze. It’s not their fault. But this feels like his, and even if he wanted to report, it’s too late now because the first thing he did when he came home was scrub away the evidence. He’ll be fine, he just has to carry on like nothing’s wrong. He pretends his hands don’t shake when he gets his gun out of his safe and holsters it at his hip. He picks up his phone and orders an Uber so he doesn’t have to walk to work. The very idea of being alone on the streets, even in broad daylight, feels like too much.

“I’m fine,” he says to his empty apartment.

The walls stare back with heavy judgement.

But he still goes outside and waits for his Uber, climbing in upon its arrival and giving directions to the precinct. Nothing can happen to him in there, surrounded by cops. An unhelpful voice reminds him that he’s also a cop and that didn’t keep anything from happening. He has more faith in his squad than himself, though, and he relaxes the moment he walks into the bullpen. Everyone’s there: Rollins, Fin, Benson, and even Stone. There must’ve been a break in the current case with their serial. 

Rollins raises her eyebrows at him as he approaches. “What happened to you, Carisi?”

He raises a hand to his cheek without thinking and pretends it doesn’t hurt to touch. The longer he stays silent, the more suspicious she gets and the more attention the squad pays. It’s stupid to lie. This is an elite detective squad who he’s seen figure out things which seem impossible to everyone else. No matter what he says, they’ll figure it out eventually. He lies anyway. 

“Slipped in the shower and hit my face on the tub. So, what’re we looking at here?”

The look Rollins gives him says she’s not letting this go, but he ignores her and focuses on the case at hand. 

A few weeks go by and the bruises heal, but the rest of Sonny is left scarred. He’s still jumpy and anxious and afraid to return to Forlini’s, but he thinks he’s fine. All things considered, he’s fine. Being fine is easier than being a victim for the squad to pity with their soft voices and kid gloves. He could still report it if he wanted to, it’s never too late, but something stops him. Maybe it’s pride. Maybe shame. Maybe something else. The point is that it doesn’t stop nagging at him constantly. 

He winds up in a new bar, nursing a beer and keeping a wary eye on the patrons. It feels weird to be drinking somewhere other than Forlini’s, almost like he’s cheating. It’s  ridiculous, but he still thinks about it while he’s there. He has no companionship here either. The entire squad is at the last place Sonny wants to go, having fun without him like they so often do. He’s always been somewhat of an outsider to the tight-knit group.

“Didn’t see you in your favorite seat,” a chilling voice says in Sonny’s ear.

It’s the  same voice from last time. Sonny stands up and tries to leave, only for the same hands that’ve haunted his nightmares to close around his forearms and drag him out of the bar, into a sedan with a narrow backseat. Not again. Not again. He starts to scream but he’s shoved face down into  the seat in a way that gives him a slight but painful rugburn. That’ll show tomorrow. He tries to say ‘no’ and ‘stop,’ but he gets nothing. Nothing but cold fingers ripping off his slacks and forcing his legs apart with his arms trapped beneath his own chest. He begs, pleads, does everything he can but he doesn’t have the leverage even though he’s not frozen uselessly this time. This is worse, because he’s a trained police officer- detective- and he still can’t do anything to protect himself. At least he doesn’t cry this time.

After it’s over, the man gets out of the backseat and shuts the door. Sonny struggles to get his hands out from under him, but not before the driver’s door opens and the man climbs into the seat. “Stay fuckin’ put,” he says, and starts the car. It would be stupid to try and get out of a moving car, and he doesn’t know if there are any weapons. Plus, Sonny doesn’t have his gun either. He’s defenseless.

The ride is painfully silent but mercifully short. They can’t have gone far, and he still has his phone so he can be tracked. As suddenly as it started, the car stops and the driver gets out to haul Sonny out of the backseat and drag him towards a building. With a sinking feeling, Sonny realizes he recognizes it. This is his apartment building, and he’s being taken up to his own apartment. He thinks he’s going to be sick. Somehow this man knows where Sonny lives, and when they get to the front door, he pulls a keyring out of his pocket and opens the door like he’s done it a million times. He has a key to Sonny’s apartment.

Moments before leaving, he grabs Sonny’s chin and examines the rug burn marring his face. “You mark easy.”

Then he’s gone, leaving Sonny in the doorway to lock himself in, not that it’ll help. This is the second time, and he let it happen. He’s weak. Stupid. Sonny crawls to his room and pulls his gun out of the safe just to hold it and feel more protected. Anyone comes through the door, he’s going to shoot. He won’t be a victim again.

But his promise is an empty one.

Over the next three months, it happens again and again and again and again and again. The squad have noticed the way he has perpetual bags  under his eyes, the ever-shifting rotation of bruises, his jumpiness. Every time they ask, he brushes them off. None of them believe him though, least of all Amanda. She presses him more every time he shows up to work with a black eye or a ring of bruises around his wrists when he rolls up his sleeves. Sonny gets this feeling  something bad is about to happen the moment he starts changing things up, like it’ll make a difference when the still nameless man knows where he lives. 

“Hey, Rollins,” he asks, putting the lid on his coffee while she eats her lunch. “I was thinkin’ I haven’t seen my goddaughter in a while. You got plans tonight?”

“No. Everything okay?”

She knows something’s up. Still, he keeps lying. “Yeah, yeah, just realized I haven’t been around lately. I’ll make you some dinner, watch some shitty reality TV…” he laughs, but it’s fake even to his own ears. While he’s wary of putting her and Jesse in danger, he thinks he’ll feel safer with her. 

“Sure- we’ll have to run to the store first though.”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

Both of them get back to work, running through the day that blurs with all the ones before it, precisely how time seems to nowadays. He’s in the grocery store with her before he knows it, trying to decide which type of pasta he feels like. Although she’s quiet, he can see her watching him out of the corner of his eye, waiting to say something about the scrape running up his forearm from the rough brick wall of the building on one side of an alley he was forced into. Just the thought makes his heart speed up with panic. 

“Are we gonna talk about this, Dominick?” she says finally.

Penne or angel hair? Penne is easier for Jesse to pick up with her little plastic fork. 

“Talk about what?”

Rollins grabs his wrist and he flinches. She raises her eyebrows at the movement before pointing at the bruise and saying, “I know you’re clumsy, but this is excessive. If someone’s hurting you, you know we have your back. I have your back.”

“No one’s hurting me,” he says.

“The longer you let it happen, the worse it’s going to get. DV always escalates, you know that.”

“There’s no DV.”

She lets it go for now, but she watches him closely all night. He doesn’t like feeling watched, analyzed, and he isn’t sure if being treated like a puzzle is worse than being treated like a victim. Jesse’s too young to sense the tension, thankfully, but old enough to see that Sonny is tired and plop herself into his lap to promptly fall asleep. She makes him feel safe, is the odd thing. This blonde little girl makes him feel less alone. Alone is a dangerous thing, an emotion that does nothing to help him when the world has grown too dangerous.

“You know it’s late, you can stay the night.”

A glance at the clock confirms it’s almost eleven. “You’re right. But, um, I gotta- I should head home, I’ve been here long enough,” he says, standing up and handing a sleeping Jesse off to Rollins. She looks like she wants to say something, but doesn’t, and he leaves calmly. 

Once he’s out the door, he’s scared out of his mind. Every single shadow is his attacker ready to grab him again and pin him facedown to be forced again. The sound of his own footsteps echo like a second pair following him everywhere he goes. He rests his hand at his hip where his gun waits, still loaded because he hasn’t gone home yet. Anyone messes with him, he’ll shoot. Just like the second time it happened when he went straight for his weapon when he had the chance. Every time he has been hurt, he hasn't had his gun. He’ll have to start carrying it on him at this rate. This has to come to an end at some point. Countless times, repetitive and more painful with each assault. Escalating, like Rollins said. 

Sonny’s tired to his very bones when he gets home, hands away from his gun now to unblock the door. He’s grabbed by the throat the second he’s inside, slammed against the suddenly closed door. He scrabbles at the hand around his neck before reaching for his gun again. In response his hand is caught and squeezed in an agonizing grip until he cries out. Just like that, his gun is ripped away and tossed somewhere he can’t reach it.

“You think you’re fuckin’ cute, going over to that bitch’s house?”

“I’m sorry,” he wheezes.

“You will be. I’ll make sure of that.”

He tries to keep fighting back because he needs this to be over. Whether he fends the man off or gets himself killed, at least it’ll finally stop. He does his best, even held against the door while the man’s free hand attacks whatever he can reach on Sonny’s body before throwing him to the floor and climbing on top of him. That’s when all the fight drains out of him. He goes lax on the carpet and stares at the braided fibers. He doesn’t feel anything anymore.

The next morning, when he comes back to himself to the sound of his alarm, he’s still lying on the floor with his slacks around his ankles and blood dried on his face. He doesn’t need to look in a mirror to know he looks terrible, but he still drags himself up to see the damage before a shower. And Sonny thinks he knows what to expect until he sees what he really looks like in his reflection. His nose is swollen with dried blood beneath it and dripping from the corner of his mouth. There’s a dark purple, very obvious handprint on his neck that dips down past the collar of his half-buttoned shirt. Maybe he can wear a scarf to hide it? But he can’t do anything about his face or the limping gait of his wobbly legs.

While he showers, he imagines calling off work for a day or two to recover. Wait until the bruises fade at least a little, and he feels less like he might collapse at any moment. His uneasy sleep on the floor brewed from blacking out of trauma didn’t get him any rest to rectify the bags under his eyes. He needs more sleep, not that it would come even if he has the chance. Sonny turns off the cold water that never warmed up and dries off to throw on a suit, coat, and scarf. It’s only fifty degrees out, not cool enough to justify the scarf, but he’ll make something up.

Sonny makes sure his gun is loaded and ready to go before he leaves the house, hailing a cab because he doesn’t have the energy to put in for an Uber right now and the idea of walking is painful. His thoughts remind him it isn’t too late to call out before he quiets them. The gross cab distracts him with thoughts of the questionable stains the whole way, but once he drops the cash in the cabbie’s hand and gets out, he’s on his own again. No doubt the second he goes in, he’ll be barraged with questions by Rollins and whoever else happens to be nearby. This is the special victims unit, they’re going to notice and talk to him like a toddler and he just can’t handle that. 

Of course Rollins catches him getting onto the elevator as she jogs in and asks him to hold it for her. He does. There’s no point prolonging the inevitable.

“Morning, Carisi- what the hell happened to your face?”

He pointedly doesn’t look at her. “I tripped going up the stairs last night, I was really tired.”

“You didn’t take the elevator to your eighth floor apartment?”

“It was broken.”

They’re on the floor below the bullpen. Just one more to go and then he can go bury himself in his work. Almost there, almost- but Rollins finally loses her patience. “Cut the crap!” He flinches and puts his arm up when she yells and moves suddenly, which doesn’t help his case. “All of a sudden, you’re showing up to work hurt all the damn time, and you mope around like a kicked puppy, and now you look like you got the hell beat out of you, Carisi!” The doors ding open and they both walk out, but she isn’t finished yet. “If you can’t trust me, for some reason, that’s fine, but I can’t sit here and not-”

“Is everything alright, detectives?” Benson asks, approaching with her eyes on the file in her hand.

“Do me a favor and look at Carisi,” Rollins says.

Silently, Sonny begs her not to. She doesn’t listen, however, and her eyes widen at the sight of him. He knows he looks bad, but not so much to get a speechless reaction from the woman who always knows what to say. He’s always admired that about her.

“He said that he fell going up the stairs last night.”

The lieutenant’s eyes fall to his neck and he self-consciously adjusts his scarf, realizing too late how it had fallen low enough to expose the top of the bruise there. “Carisi, take off your scarf.”

“I’m- I- actually, I’m kinda cold, I can’t- I-”

“Carisi,” she says in her tone that leaves no room for argument.

He internally braces himself and unwinds it, revealing the bruised handprint spanning his throat like a necklace. Both Rollins and Benson inhale sharply before he covers it up again to make it feel less real. They usher him into the soft interview room, exactly like he worried they would. Sonny doesn’t want their pity. Benson gets her notepad, but Rollins just brings him a hot coffee with the exact amount of sugar and creamer he likes because she pays attention to small things like that. Really, he’s surprised it took so long to get here even if it’s the last place he’d ever want to be.

“You started coming to work with bruises what, three months ago? Four?” Rollins asks gently.

Sonny clears his throat and says, “Three and a half.”

The scratch of a pen denotes Benson writing it down. Everything he says will be, he thinks as he checks his hip for his gun; he can protect himself now. Even if it never helped him before.

“Has it been escalating?”

“I…” Yes, it has, but it’s nothing he can’t handle. “I guess so. Last night was- he was angry I wasn’t where he thought I should be.”

That’s scribbled on the pad too. He thinks he might be sick if they make him recount it.

“So why don’t you tell me about last night, Dominick?”

Using his first name is what makes him crack. “Don’t talk to me like a battered victim. I hate that.”

He watches Rollins and Benson share a long look, talking silently about him and excluding him from their conversation. It doesn’t put him at ease at all. This is more nerve-wracking than he expected, and given that he knows he’s being watched by his repeated attacker, it wouldn’t shock him to see the man burst through the door of this interview room to hurt him again. He finds himself staring at the door and clenching his fists so hard beneath the table his knuckles go white.

“Sonny? You still with us?”

Sonny instead of Dominick. Rollins is really pulling out the stops on this one.

“Yeah. Sorry.”

She offers him a comforting smile that probably works on every victim who’s not him. “You can tell us what happened, you’re safe now.”

“I, uh, I came home from Rollins’ apartment kinda late last night. He was- he was waiting for me. I walked in the door and he grabbed my neck and pushed me against the wall. I tried- I tried- I tried to get my gun but he stopped me and threw it to the side. And I tried to fight back but he got mad, kept hittin’ me over and over and over and then he threw me on the ground, ripped my pants off and…”

He can’t make himself say it. His mouth is dry and his hands are cold and his eyes are stinging with tears. All he can think about is the knowledge it’s going to happen again and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.

“He knows where I live. The second time, he- he drove me home after. He had a key to my apartment. He’s been following me and he always shows up when I don’t have my gun but last night, I didn’t come home on time and… that’s why he was so angry.”

“Has he assaulted you before, Sonny?” Benson asks.

This is the hard part. Admitting  it happened to him multiple times because he’s too weak to protect himself. How does he say that most of the time, he completely froze and couldn’t fight back.

“At least every couple weeks for the last three and a half months, when the bruises started. He’d come find me wherever I was. The first time was in- was in the Forlini’s bathroom. The next was in the backseat of his car. Then it was my apartment, and then an alleyway, and then- I can’t- he did it so many times, and I couldn’t do anything.”

“Can you tell us who he is?”

Sonny shakes his head. “I don’t know his name. He’s, um, a couple inches taller than me. White guy with brown hair, brown eyes. Wears layers, I think- I think he works blue collar. He has callouses on his hands.”

“Anything else?” Benson asks. “Maybe tattoos, or birthmarks, or scars?”

He shakes his head again and wraps his arms around himself like it’ll make him feel safer. Every part of his body aches but he’s gotten good at ignoring it over time. Practice makes perfect. All this time spent hiding it, he’s used to pretending nothing is wrong even when it is, when it’s killing him slowly. Something moves in the corner of his vision and he looks up to see Rollins offering him tissues. He didn’t realize he was crying. He takes it from her with a grateful nod and dries his face. 

“Why don’t you go splash some cold water on your face, and then I’ll have Rollins take you to the hospital to get checked out?” 

“Okay,” he mumbles, standing up and crumpling the tissue in his face. It’ll be good to have a chance to try and put himself back together before the humiliating procedures he knows he’ll be subjected to in the ER. Behind him, he hears Rollins and Benson talking too quietly for him to make out the words. He doesn’t bother putting his scarf back on just to go wash his face in the bathroom, now that everyone knows what he couldn’t manage to fight off. What he let happen to him.

In his peripheral vision he sees someone following him but brushes it off as his anxiety getting the better of him yet again. He’s safe in the precinct, even if he isn’t anywhere else. Sonny pushes open the bathroom door, finding it thankfully empty, and turns on the sink. Maybe this will be over. He knows how hard the rest of the squad work to protect victims. As hard as it is to admit, he’s a victim. He’s weak.

The bathroom door opens again and he turns around. It’s him. Again. All noise dies in Sonny’s throat as he backs away. 

“Please, no-”

“You think you can get away from me?”

His back hits the wall and those calloused hands are on him again and Sonny grabs his gun and fires. It only takes one shot, echoing in the tile bathroom and probably through the whole precinct as well. Sonny’s left shaking, pinned against the wall by a dead body that’s covering him in blood. First in the door is Fin, followed by a uni and then Benson.

“Carisi? Are you alright?”

He can’t answer. Someone pulls the body off of him and he drops his gun from his shaking hands. He just killed someone. There’s a dead body. He’s covered in blood. Christ, there’s so much blood. So much. It’s everywhere. He can’t wipe his face because it’s coating his hands. He can’t breathe. He can’t think. He can’t.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay. It’s okay, Carisi. Deep breath.”

Rollins must’ve gotten here at some point because now she’s in front of him trying to get him to breathe in more than gasping bursts. His hands keep shaking and he can’t make them stop. The world is spinning. But everything is finished now. He’s finally safe.

**Author's Note:**

> Catch me on tumblr @space-carisi


End file.
